Midwestern flooding devastates farmers

NOAA map; click the image to enlarge it

"Midwestern states are at a heightened flood risk this spring, bad news for large swaths of the country already grappling with devastating effects of unprecedented flooding in recent weeks, according to a spring outlook issued Thursday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration," Kate Queram reports for Route Fifty.

Twenty-five states are at major or moderate risk of flooding through May, and the flooding in the Midwest recently will get worse in the coming weeks, making it a "potentially unprecedented flood season, with more than 200 million people at risk for flooding in their communities," said Ed Clark, director of NOAA's National Water Center.

The news is especially dire for Midwestern soybean and corn farmers. Many could not sell their harvests last year because their main customer, China, is embroiled in a trade war with the U.S. So farmers have been storing their harvests in makeshift bins and even on the ground covered by tarps, Humeyra Pamuk, P.J. Huffstutter, and Tom Polansek report for Reuters.

"Now, the unthinkable has happened. Record floods have devastated a wide swath of the Farm Belt across Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota and several other states. Early estimates of lost crops and livestock are approaching $1 billion in Nebraska alone. With more flooding expected, damages are expected to climb much higher for the region," Reuters reports. "As river levels rose, spilling over levees and swallowing up townships, farmers watched helplessly as the waters consumed not only their fields, but their stockpiles of grain, the one thing that can stand between them and financial ruin."

Also, the flood damage to roads, bridges and rail lines will make it difficult for farmers to move their harvests to processing plants or shipping hubs, Reuters reports.